


I am trying to break your heart, Dave Strider

by spacepuck



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb Session, Angst, M/M, because when do i not write angst honestly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-04
Updated: 2017-07-04
Packaged: 2018-11-22 14:15:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11381886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacepuck/pseuds/spacepuck
Summary: "He easily slipped himself back under your skin, into your blood, and had you hooked all over again.And yet, every morning, you couldn’t shake the feeling that he needed to leave. That if things could go wrong once, they could go wrong again at twice the speed and double the ache."John Egbert, 26, still stuck physically and spiritually in Washington, faces his past when his ex-boyfriend is in town.





	I am trying to break your heart, Dave Strider

**Author's Note:**

> (this is for [johndaveweek](http://www.johndaveweek.tumblr.com)'s day two prompt, song day, so you might be inclined to check out the [lyrics](http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/wilco/iamtryingtobreakyourheart.html), or listen to the song linked in the first line. or not!)

[Seattle was never really the place for you.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlxH9-TYseY)

You shouldn’t have let him find you here.

The day is on the brink of going dark, and the city hums irritable white noise outside your window. You’ve never liked Seattle much; it was a distraction for a short while, but lately you find yourself yearning your late father’s home surrounded by the checkerboard of white houses and the smell of pine. When sirens wail in the distance, you try to remember what quiet sounded like—in the piano room, the kitchen, perched on the steps during sundown…

Maybe you feel homesick because your neighbor likes to smoke cigars in the evening. You’re not really sure. 

Your phone vibrates in your hand as the streetlamps flicker on outside.

RECEIVED: hey man are we still on for tonight lmk

The noise of Seattle bothers you, and yet, the first night Dave was in town, he had laughed at the pockets of quiet. 

“You would hate Los Angeles,” he said. “I feel like I’m in a sensory deprivation tank.”

And you had laughed, more than a couple cocktails in, and later in the night you had taken him back to your apartment. In the morning, you woke up beside him, sun hitting his dark sleeping shoulders, and something from deep in the pit of your stomach burned hot and uncomfortable. 

You look down at your phone. Your thumb hovers over the text to respond, but you stand in front of the window, hesitating. 

To be blunt, Dave was more excited to see you than you were to see him. While he smiled big and honest, standing from his barstool to hug you around your shoulders—something you know had taken time for him to fully embrace himself—you could only feel nerves numbing the whole underside of your skin. But you hugged him back, just for a moment, before feeling yourself smile back at him. 

And you don’t know if it was the drinks, or the way he talked about his assistant director job, the way he splayed his hands gesturing to SeaTac, Des Moines, Westport on the invisible map of Washington before him, but you quickly found yourself feeling much like you did when you were fifteen. Becoming aware of the pulse in your wrists, yearning to kiss him as he kept you awake in your childhood bedroom with endless streams of texts about nothing, about everything. He talked, and he talked, and you listened. 

Dave’s first night in Seattle wasn’t the last time you took him back to your apartment. The days he had free off, he would make you scavenger hunt for him before you found which place he settled into next—sometimes bars, sometimes convenience stores, sometimes on the pier reaching into Elliot Bay—and he would always smile and start asking questions.

(“How’s it been lately?”)

(“Are you ever going to leave Washington?”)

(“Do you want to dance with me?”)

He easily slipped himself back under your skin, into your blood, and had you hooked all over again. 

And yet, every morning, you couldn’t shake the feeling that he needed to leave. That if things could go wrong once, they could go wrong again at twice the speed and double the ache.

You thumb your phone before finally responding. As the night quickly overtakes the colors of sunset, you grab your jacket and keys.

_What was I thinking when I let you back in?_

_\--_

“Egbert, do you dare me to climb to the top of the Ferris wheel?”

“Only if you promise you won’t swan dive into the bay.”

“But I’ve been practicing for this moment _exactly_. You really gonna rip my dream out from under my feet?”

You laugh, shoving your hands deep into your pockets. The October nights have become chilly in the past week. Dave wears a scarf loosely wrapped around his neck, though you can at times hear his teeth chatter behind his words. 

“You really want to die at twenty-six?” you ask.

He hums as he eyes the Ferris wheel. You watch as he tries to nonchalantly slip his hands into his pockets, but you can tell they’re becoming that spotty, purply cold.

“Nah, I promised I would at least try to make it past forty in this life. Guess it’ll have to wait.” 

“Yeah. Maybe in your next life, though.”

You hear him laugh breathily as the water laps slow against the pier. 

“Yeah, maybe.”

You can’t help but feel comfortable walking beside him. He continues talking, funny little anecdotes and things that have happened on set in the past week, and you notice your heart grow warm and settled. 

And maybe this is where you always find the edge. Where you start to _notice_ the little unconscious tics and changes happening, heart and system working against memory. Memories still somewhat fresh, still somewhat painful on sleepless nights. The flush and burn of remembering the exact words traded and left to sting. 

_What was I thinking when I said it didn’t hurt?_

_What was I thinking when I let go of you?_

_What was I thinking when I said hello?_

“John?”

Startled, you look at him. You can feel the cold more clearly. 

“Dave,” you say. Then, a breath. “Um, sorry.” 

He steps a little closer to you in stride, knocking his elbow against yours. 

“You’re spacing out,” he says. 

“I know. I’m thinking.”

“About?”

“Nothing.” 

He starts to retaliate, and you can only find yourself say again, more firmly, “Nothing.” 

“Oh, come on,” he says. He stops walking and grips your elbow, forcing you to stop alongside him. “Cut the bullshit, Egbert. Something’s been bothering you.”

You stare down at him in silence, chewing on the inside of your lip. Exasperated, he drops your arm from his grip.

“You’ve been acting weird ever since I got here. You meet up with me, you make goo-goo eyes at me until you take me home and lay down all your affections and shit, but then you wake up and…” 

He waves a hand vaguely. 

“It’s like some Hyde and Jekyll shit, to be honest. And lately I feel like I can never tell which one I’m going to get at like, any given moment.” 

You cross your arms uncomfortably and look at your feet. He sighs.

“Look, Seattle’s been fun, and seeing you again has been the highlight of this whole thing. But one moment it feels like we’re twenty again, and the next, it feels like we’ve been estranged for fifty years. You’re giving me fucking whiplash, dude.”

“Dave…”

You reach up under your glasses to rub your eyes. When you look at him again, he’s watching you, eyes urging you to say something.

You take a breath.

“I just… I don’t think I can keep seeing you like this. I can feel myself getting back into our old routine, you know? And the last time we did this…”

He looks away from you again, scowling softly. 

“We were young, stupid, and surrounded with other shit happening in life. I remember. I was there.”

“…Right.” You reach up to rub the nape of your neck, feeling it heat up. “But I just don’t know if I can do it again. I mean, what if things haven’t really changed? What if _we_ haven’t really changed?”

“You’re breaking my heart here, Egbert.” 

“Well, you broke mine first.” 

“That’s so…” 

He bites his tongue, but you know what he wants to say. _Fucking childish_. Instead, he heaves a bitter sigh and looks at you again. 

“Forget it. You know what, it’s cool. Maybe I should have seen this coming, you know, considering, but…I guess I’ve just been getting my hopes up.” 

You open your mouth to speak, but you have nothing to say. A part of you wanted this—the “avoid heartbreak again at all costs” part of you wanted this exact thing to happen. And yet, another part of you is starting to fold up like a paper crane, knowing full well that he was and always will be unavoidable in your mind and presence. There is little resolution happening under your skin, and it leaves you at a loss for words.

Seeing you have nothing to say, he sighs again, patting your arm once and taking a step away. 

“I’m headed to Westport tomorrow. I probably won’t be coming back here.” 

You nod, quiet and dumb. He takes another few slow steps away from you, opening his mouth to speak—but says nothing. Instead, he opts to turn on his heel and head down the remainder of the pier, leaving you behind.

And you do want to call out to him, but you don’t. You watch him leave until the road gets too dark to see him anymore.

When you head home, you can smell the faint linger of cigar smoke in the hallway. It follows you inside, all the way to bed, where you drop in silence. 

You lie there for a while. Though your head, heart, blood spins, you don’t cry for a while. You even fall asleep, fitful and dreamless, before waking up in the middle of the night to cry into your hands for a long time. 

This isn’t fair, you think. Why does this asshole always make your heart hurt so much? 

Lying in bed, tear-stained and weary, you can only think of when you were both seventeen, praying for some cosmic entity to unite the borders of Texas and Washington so you could be some thousands of miles closer. There were nights you cried then, too, in love yet so warped in fear it made your ears ring. 

You suppose it’s the same now, but the fear—and the love, too, you suppose—is different. Deep-rooted in your veins, fear that lingers so long its embedded its fingerprints on the back of your skull. 

When you were younger, the fear didn’t seem to get to you like this. You don’t know what happened. 

But hiding hasn’t worked, and you don’t know why you thought it would. This city, big and blinking, was not here to help you cower, and you know that goes the same for all the other cities and plains and suburban lands. There is no hiding from yourself; there is no hiding from him and his existence.

As you feel the emotion wind down, you pat the bed for your phone, grasping it and letting the screen blind you. You hardly glance at the time before calling Dave’s number from his last text. 

The line rings for a long time before bringing you to his voicemail. And, voice thick and wavering, you say,

“Dave? It's me. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I love you—I’m the man who loves you.”

**Author's Note:**

> you know, this probably has a happy ending, but that's how the song ends my friends. 
> 
> hmu @ spacepuck.tumblr.com


End file.
